Job Discussion Forums

kimo · Joined: 16 Feb 2003 Posts: 668

I've generally had a positive experience with people from India, but I've always found that it's takes me more than a few hours to adapt to their accents when I haven't been around them in a while.

I do work for an IT company here in Beijing helping high-level English speakers hone their communication skills. They claim the Indians they deal with are utterly incomprehensible. One of their American clients recently concurred. Well, now, such difficulties will soon be gone with the wind.

Check out this advertisment from a website in China:

scot47 · Joined: 10 Jan 2003 Posts: 15343

I am not believing this. I am thinking is hoax.
Why someone is posting this ?

They are badmash and I am ready to pay one crore of rupees for the apprehension of these miscreants.

kimo · Joined: 16 Feb 2003 Posts: 668

Here it is, Scot. Hoax or not, I'm not sure. It might be necessary to scroll down, to find it in the Teaching Jobs section.

http://www.thatsmagazines.com/classifieds/result.asp?sectionid=5&location=bj&categoryid=39

biffinbridge · Joined: 05 May 2003 Posts: 701 Location: Frank's Wild Years

I am not understanding vere in the problem is lying with the proliferation of Keralan English.Eveything same same Mr.Scot 47.

Aramas · Posted: Wed May 05, 2004 3:13 pm Post subject:

I had several Indian lecturers at college, none of whom were particularly easy to understand. One fellow kept mentioning a 'waa-oo', and it took us several weeks to figure out that he was trying to say 'valve' Smile

khmerhit · Posted: Wed May 05, 2004 4:00 pm Post subject:

Indian women have lovely accents. Cool

justcolleen · Joined: 07 Jan 2004 Posts: 654 Location: Egypt, baby!

Ailian · Joined: 15 Apr 2004 Posts: 192 Location: PRC!

kev7161 · Joined: 06 Feb 2004 Posts: 5880 Location: Suzhou, China

We have one Indian teacher here and he seems to be okay with his English. I generally understand everything he says with no problems. My friend from Nigeria, however. . . . that's another story altogether!!

scot47 · Joined: 10 Jan 2003 Posts: 15343

Nigeria ! I went to teach there in 1978 and found that I barely understood Nigerians when they talked in English.

My fault or theirs ?

zaneth · Posted: Thu May 06, 2004 8:14 am Post subject:

I tried to get an Indian guy in town to read some texts onto tape for me to use with students. Wanted to do something with world English. But he wasn't into it, just wanted me to introduce some women to him directly. Ick.

Saris are lovely indeed. One of my many strange memories from India was seeing women in saris riding side-saddle on the back of little motorcycles, holding an infant in their arms. The toddler was sitting in front of Dad.

With some people there I had to put on an Indian accent so they could understand me. But when I ran into another westerner who'd been there long enough to pick up the accent and the head wag, I found it extremely annoying.

Roger · Joined: 19 Jan 2003 Posts: 9138

As so often, the problem of "understanding them" has been exaggerated out of any proportion! How on Earth can Sonya Gandhi understand her in-laws or other Indians? Has any Indian been fired from their Silicon Valley job over their poor pronunciation skills?
And, conversely speaking, how can WE expect THEM to UNDERSTAND US?

dmb · Joined: 12 Feb 2003 Posts: 8397

My ex-students in the Gulf were always complaining about not understanding the Indian teachers. I'm not sure if this is true as I had no problems with understanding them. It could be just down to racism and pre conceived ideas

scot47 · Joined: 10 Jan 2003 Posts: 15343

Certainly in Saudi and the UAE students are often not happy with Indo-pak teachers.

Some places simply will not hire them. That can cause problems for second generation UK citizens of Indian origin.

tammy · Joined: 07 Jan 2004 Posts: 45

I once contacted an organisation in India for English training and they were really interested to hire me.. until they found out that I was a UK citizen of Indo-Pak origin. Despite the numerous emails I sent them, I never heard from them again.